


Succinct, Persuasive

by ossapher



Series: The Macaroniverse -- Lams Modern AU [5]
Category: American Revolution RPF, Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Angelica Schuyler is a badass, Burr is Alex's writing tutor, College AU, Dad Friend Hercules Mulligan, F/M, Herc's a cool RA, but has flaws just like everybody else, chronically ill Alex, imposter syndrome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-28
Updated: 2017-04-28
Packaged: 2018-10-24 21:22:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,040
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10750071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ossapher/pseuds/ossapher
Summary: Freshly arrived at an elite east coast university, Alexander Hamilton hands in a twenty-six page essay for a twelve-page prompt. He thinks it'll earn him an A.Instead, it earns him a trip to the writing tutor.





	Succinct, Persuasive

**Author's Note:**

> Alex has HIV in this verse. I had to take it out of the tags for complicated fandom drama reasons, but it's explained in more detail in the backstory/ headcanons fic "Bullet Points."
> 
> Thanks to [errorandglory](http://errorandglory.tumblr.com/) and [herowndeliverance](http://herowndeliverance.tumblr.com/) for the lightning-fast betas and everyone else I've nattered to about this :)

“ _What!”_ Alex cries, before he can stop himself. Nobody pays him any attention—they’re all too busy flipping through their own essays, trying to decipher the professor’s handwriting or else frantically calculate percentages in their heads.

Alex doesn’t have either problem. There’s only one comment—“see page limit”—and although he doesn’t know off the top of his head what 32.5/70 is, he knows it’s way, way, way less than 95% and therefore unacceptable. His stomach squirms.

“Professor,” he says, striding back to the lectern and cornering Professor Cooper, “I believe there’s been a mistake.”

She looks over her horn-rimmed glasses with an air of weary amusement. “Do you?”

“Yes, Professor, I—”

“You can call me Millie, Alex. Everyone calls me Millie.”

Alex makes a face before he can stop himself. All his professors here go by their first names; it’s a tiny, private, rich-kid-school thing and it’s exceedingly weird. “Millie,” he says, struggling not to pull another face, “I clearly answered the prompt, I _know_ that I wrote a good essay, I _know_ that this score doesn’t reflect the quality of this essay, so why—”

“What does the comment say?”

Alex grits his teeth. He doesn’t mind the Socratic method when the topic is interesting and he’s not so familiar with it that he can predict the professor’s questions; right now, he feels like Professor Cooper—Millie—is trying to lead him by the nose to the conclusion that he never should have spoken up at all, and it irks him. “The comment says, ‘see page limit,’ but—”

“Did you read the essay prompt? You referred to it.”

“Yes, I read the prompt, but—”

“And what did the prompt say about the page limit?”

“Twelve pages, but—”

“And how many pages was your essay?”

“Twenty-six, but—”

“And do you remember what I said in class about what I would do if you turned in an essay over the page limit?”

Alex falters. “Um. I—I actually don’t? When… when did you…”

“Let me check the syllabus,” Professor Cooper says, rifling through her stack of papers. “Ah, yes. It would have been the first Monday of October. When the essay was assigned. We discussed outlining techniques for the first half of class and then went over all your questions about the assignment.”

“I was at a doctor’s appointment. I sent you an email…” He’d walked around feeling like he was being stabbed in the lower back for most of September, which was pretty normal for him, but he’d thrown up four times that morning and he had to draw the line _somewhere_.

Well, technically Herc had drawn the line, because Alex has a really fucked-up sense of what constitutes a medical emergency, but either way, he went to the doctor, and as it turned out his antiretrovirals put him at increased risk for fucking kidney stones. So yeah, he’s been dealing with that, but he’s mostly been able to power through it, and his schoolwork hasn’t suffered.

Until now, apparently.

“Oh, yes, I remember.” Professor Cooper pushes her glasses up her nose, giving Alex her full attention. “Someone specifically asked how essays exceeding the limit would be graded. I said that I wouldn’t read past the twelfth page no matter how much you wrote, and I would grade on the basis of the completeness of the essay at that point.”

Hence his score of less than 50%. Perfect. “Professor, that’s unfair.”

Professor Cooper frowns faintly, and Alex _knows_ what she’s going to ask next. She’s going to ask: “Do you remember the absence policy, as enumerated in the syllabus and discussed on the first day of class?” And then Alex will have to say, “Yes, it’s my responsibility to make an appointment with you if I miss a day, or at least get notes from someone, or otherwise find a way to get any relevant information I might have missed,” and then she’ll say, “Well, then you’ll see why I can’t help you, good luck keeping your scholarship, you might as well pack your bags and move back to Bakersfield now, so I sure hope you like picking strawberries; also, I’m telling Washington you’re a disappointment and a failure and he’s going to burn with shame every time he thinks about how he stuck his neck out to give you a chance here.”

Except, after a moment’s contemplation, she says, “The first twelve pages of your essay were… wordy, but the thinking in them was quite original. You clearly engaged passionately with the subject, which is something I rarely see in first-year writing seminars.”

Alex doesn’t allow himself to hope. “Thank you, Professor.”

She only twitches one eyebrow, but he flinches.

“I mean Millie,” he blurts immediately, kicking himself. He’s so used to titles. He’s never been on real friendly terms with an adult before—well, maybe Director Washington, but he’s one of nature’s “sir”s. They’ve all demanded the verbal forms of respect and he almost wishes Professor Cooper would, just so he’d know where he stands with her. For fuck’s sake, she has the power to crush all his ambitions and dreams, does he really have to call her _Millie_ on top of that?

She taps a pen to her mouth, seeming to consider him anew. “Did you write much in high school, Alex?”

“I have a blog.”

“I mean, in an academic setting.”

“My blog’s plenty academic. I was retweeted by E—”

“For a grade,” she says, her tone growing slightly sour.

Alex glances down involuntarily, feeling like his glare could burn a hole in the carpet. His blog’s awesome. He grits his teeth, forces his eyes back up, and speaks breezily. “I didn’t go to the best high school. But I always got As.”

“Hmm.” She taps her pen against her chin as though mentally weighing those As, clearly unimpressed. "Well, the transition to college-level writing is often a difficult one, no matter where you went to high school. Success in one environment is... not necessarily a guarantee of success in another."

His anger sputters, chokes. He’d been proud of his high school grades. Apparently they’re worthless here.

He struggles to recover. “But I had to write an essay to get my...my scholarship, I mean, I’m not bad at writing! I think, if you read my whole essay, you’ll see that—”

“I’m not going to read your whole essay, Alex.” She tilts her head to one side. “Do you often struggle with succinctness?”

Alex feels like he’s an inflatable balloon-person and Professor Cooper is slowly letting the air out. He doesn’t know what to do. He’s going to lose his scholarship if he gets a C or below in any class, and this essay was a third of his grade. He got around a 50%, so he’s already at a low B even if he gets full credit for everything else in this class, ever, which, okay, he can do, unless he gets sick again, or Professor Cooper decides she doesn’t like him because of this argument, or because he sometimes gets carried away and totally dominates the class discussion...

He struggles to keep his voice from growing shrill as he says, “Can we maybe discuss what extra credit options you have?”

“You know, we have a wonderful writing center,” she says, a little dreamily. “We’ve just hired a new tutor who is _very_ talented, Aaron Burr; he won the Henry Award last year—”

“Okay, but I don’t need a writing center, you know I know how to write already, can I just—can I just write something more for you so I can—”

“You’re already capable of writing _more_ ,” she says, with a significant glance at the slab of essay in his hands. “You need someone who can show you how to write _less_.”

“But I—”

“I think this situation can be resolved to the satisfaction of us both if he assists you. Two sessions should do it. Shall we set a deadline of, oh, next Friday? The Friday after?”

“Prof—Millie. I don’t need a tutor. I promise you that.”

“You’re in no position to bargain, young man,” she says airily, packing up her papers. She makes to breeze out of the room, and Alex trots behind her, snatching up his backpack from where he left it on the table. “Burr is incredible with words—he’s succinct, persuasive. Your essay needs to be condensed: he’s the solution.”

“But I—”

“His office hours are here,” she says, digging around in her briefcase as she shoulders her way through the door. She comes up with a little quarter-sheet flyer for the writing center on lilac paper. Alex takes it like it’s been dipped in acid. “He’ll keep me informed of your progress.”

 So he won’t be able to blow off the tutor entirely—he’ll have to at least show up. He hopes this Aaron Burr guy won’t be offended that Alex doesn’t need his help. "So—so wait, you want me to revise _this_ essay—you don't want a new one?"

She keeps walking, but at least she answers, even as he's following her out the door and into the parking lot, and she's rummaging in her briefcase again for her keys. "Yes, of course, a new one would completely defeat the point. Excuse me, Alex, I have an appointment for a haircut across town."

 _Well God fucking forbid I get in the way of your fucking_ _haircut_ , Alex wants to scream, but at the last moment his sense of self-preservation, already in overdrive, kicks him sharply between the eyes, and then furiously points out that he doesn't know when this thing's due, anyway, and that he has another two essays and a chemistry exam coming up, and—

“I’ll have it to you by the end of the week,” he says. Professor Cooper climbs into her Prius and looks at him pointedly. He wonders for a full ten seconds why she's just sitting around, if she's got this haircut that's so fucking important coming up, and then realizes, finally, what she's waiting for.

He forces a smile that feels more like a howl. “Thanks, Millie.”

***

“I mean, can you _believe_ that?!” Alex cries. “Only twenty-six pages and she refu— _ow!_ ”

“S’ry,” Herc manages, through a mouthful of pins. He pinches the fabric under Alex’s armpit into place and carefully stabs the pins into a pincushion one by one. They're in the common room of their suite—they have a fucking two-bedroom _suite_ , it's ridiculous, although Alex knows he only got the single because of his medical issues and only wound up next to Herc because nobody else wanted to live right next to an RA. Their fucking loss. Herc's great.

“Shoulders down, Alex, I need you symmetrical or it isn’t gonna hang straight.”

“Right so _anyway_ ,” Alex continues, “she says, twenty-six pages, no, I refuse! I’ll only read twelve! And I’m like, really? Really? _Ow!_ ”

“That wasn’t even me,” Herc says. He’s standing behind Alex, but Alex can _hear_ him frowning. “If you’re gonna wave your arms around while wearing a blazer stuck full of pins…”

“Sorry,” Alex says, though he’s not. “I just—it just drives me nuts that she didn’t read it. It was a great goddamn essay.”

“Please tell me you didn’t scream at her.”

“I learned my lesson with the bursar, actually.” Alex hangs his head, and Herc hisses as the blazer shifts. “Sorry, sorry. I guess—I guess in the moment I was more… disappointed... than angry, anyway.” And humiliated, but he doesn’t want to say that, either. Back at home, when he’d had nothing, at least he’d had his brain to be proud of. He may have been a scrawny orphan with an attitude problem and HIV, but he’d also been a goddamn force of nature who was going to write his way out, if he lived that long. And he’d achieved both of those minor miracles. He’d flung himself out so hard, he’d probably left scorch marks.

“Because your scholarship,” Herc fills in.

“Yeah,” Alex says, because that’s simpler than saying, _no, because my entire sense of self_. And even though he trusts Herc to be careful with his pins, and not to judge him for the enormous quantity of free dental dams and condoms he steals from the table outside his door, and to help him discriminate between normal-sick and dangerous-sick… he doesn’t trust him with this yet. He should—he really should.

One, Herc owes him for agreeing to serve as his mannequin after his poor sweet Thimbleina was stolen by a bunch of giggling tri-Delts on a scavenger hunt. (Not that Alex minds getting to model Herc’s edgy, sculptural creations every once in awhile. They make him feel badass. Particularly the poison-green women’s blazer currently taking shape on his shoulders.)

Two, Herc’s also first-gen, he was born in Nigeria, he knows what it’s like to stick out like a sore thumb. Alex frowns. Does that metaphor make sense? Why do sore thumbs stick out? Are they swollen or something? What happened to Herc’s poor sore thumb? In this case, was it sore from the hammer-blow of class, racial, and native-born privilege?

“So what’re you gonna do?”

Herc’s words break in on Alex’s thoughts, and Alex struggles to recapture his earlier bluster. “Oh. Uh, well, it’s ridiculous, really, she says—can you believe this? She says I have to go to the writing center. Isn’t that—isn’t that funny?”

“I’ve heard the writing center’s nice,” Herc says equitably. “Try lifting your arms.”

Alex waves to an invisible admiring crowd to his left, to his right. He blows kisses. “Thank you, really, Senators, you’re too kind.” The blazer stays trim, not bunching under his armpits or pooching out across his chest. “I like the way it moves. Darting it was a good choice. And I’m sure it’s nice, if you suck at writing, but I don’t need help writing an essay and I definitely don’t need help trimming down one I’ve already written. Except she says she’s going to check in with this Burr guy to see if I’m actually going, so...” He trails off, sighs. “So I’m stuck.”

“Burr?” Herc repeats. “As in Aaron Burr?”

“What, do you know him?” It figures; all the RAs gossip among themselves. Herc probably has dirt on everyone who lives in the dorms.

“I—well—hm.” Herc’s brows scrunch together. “No. Not really, I—he’s not a bad guy, I guess. I think we may have had Macroeconomics together.”

And _that_ is something remarkable. Herc has the best memory for faces and names Alex has ever seen; he’s seen Herc walk into a dining hall and not only know every person there, but also be able to compliment them on their new glasses/ haircut/ tattoo and ask specific questions like, “How’d adding the history minor work out?” So, if he’s admitting to having had class with Aaron Burr but doesn’t know anything about him… wow.

“You could ask Ange if she knows anything, if you’re so concerned?” Herc says. Angelica is also a prime source for gossip; she’s less outgoing than Herc is, but she has this instinct for reading people that makes Alex envious.

“I dunno,” Alex says, suppressing his urge to shrug. “Wouldn’t that be bothering her?”

Herc looks incredulous. “ _Bothering_ her? This is An _gel_ ica we’re talking about? Angelica who booty-called you at 2 a.m. on a _Wednesday_?”

“She knows I don’t sleep,” Alex mutters.

“Still. I think a simple text, during normal business hours, would not constitute bothering.”

Alex feels his face reddening. He’s still kind of shaken from the conversation a couple weeks ago where he spilled the secret of his HIV, an event apparently so shocking for Angelica that she’d had to reply in a letter, and then _he’d_ written back with a letter long and tormented even by his standards, and yeah, they’ve talked since then but they haven’t talked about _that_ and now that his _writing_ of all things has been called into question, well… the world feels less secure than it used to, and he wouldn’t exactly call his month-long relationship with Angelica solid ground. Which is not to say that it _isn’t_ , it’s just that… he’s not sure he has enough evidence to make the call. “I just… I just don’t know if she likes me that much…”

Herc actually bursts out laughing. “Oh my God, Alex, trust me. If Ange doesn’t like you, that’s not a thing you can really avoid knowing.” But he stops when he sees the expression on Alex’s face. “Okay. Okay, if it’s bothering you that much, I can text her myself. Or we can ask her at dinner tonight.”

“Please don’t text her,” Alex blurts. “I can find out about Burr some other way. Do you remember anything more about him?”

Herc frowns. He reaches up to adjust the angle of Alex’s arm and carefully marks something on the fabric. “I mean, from what I remember, the guy’s just… normal.”

“He won the Henry Prize,” Alex points out. “He’s smart.”

“Well. He wasn’t in-your-face about it. Which isn’t to say it’s a bad thing to be conspicuously intelligent!” Herc tacks on, at Alex’s glare.

A moment later, Alex looks down, shamefaced. “Clearly not conspicuously enough.”

“Oh, hey now,” Herc says, with a reassuring hand on Alex’s shoulder, “there’s nothing wrong with getting a little help now and then.”

And that makes him feel worse, makes him feel self-conscious about confiding in Herc the way he has. He brushes Herc’s hand off. “Yeah, sure.” And damn, now Herc probably wants an explanation for that. He sighs. “I’m just… it’s just stressful, that’s all.”

“You could always go to the counseling center? There are support groups for—”

“I think I’d rather lick a live mousetrap.” Get supremely unhelpful help for his objection to being forced to get supremely unhelpful help. It’s so sad it’s hilarious.

“I’m serious.”

Alex shrugs out of the blazer, wincing as the pins prick his side. “I just remembered I have something due tomorrow.”

“Alex—”

“No, really. Chemistry pre-lab assignment. Lots of math.” That he can complete in ten minutes, but an excuse is an excuse.

Herc looks crestfallen, standing there with the blazer dangling from his hands. “Alex, look, I’m sorry, I—”

“Knock on my door for dinner, okay?” Alex smiles as he leaves, not sure if he’s just successfully defended himself or if he’s being a total dick.  

***

Just after six, with his chemistry prelab long since finished, there’s a knock at his door. Alex greets Herc with a sheepish smile, having decided that maybe he’d overreacted a little. But Herc seems willing to drop the subject of counseling, and Alex lets it go with relief.

“Oh, I texted Ange. She’s meeting us in the dining hall,” Herc says, and Alex hears _sorry about earlier_.

“Really? Thanks!” _Apology accepted_. Question closed. Alex, one — shrinks, zero.

Angelica, it transpires, has a source close to Burr. He and Herc join her table, and Alex learns that Burr’s a senior; that he's a classics major who takes a lot of philosophy classes; that he’s dating Theo Bartow and that John Prevost, who had thought _he_ was dating Theo Bartow, is unhappy about this; and that he stays in the dorms over most breaks because his parents are dead and he doesn't have anywhere he likes to go home to.

Alex’s ears prick up at that. There aren’t many orphans his age. At least, there aren’t many here. He’s even more curious about Burr now that he knows they have something in common. “But what is he _like?_ ” he asks Angelica, between shoveled mouthfuls of chow mein from the “international” station.

She shrugs. “Sorry, Alex. That’s all I know.”

“Herc said he’s normal, would you agree with that?”

Herc rolls his eyes, and Angelica gives his arm a playful backhand. “Really, Herc? ‘Normal’ is the best descriptor you could come up with?”

“The man’s an enigma,” says Herc, not looking up from the meat he’s cutting.

“Not to all of us,” Angelica smirks.

Alex takes out his phone and looks up Burr on the Henry Prize website. To his surprise, a PDF of Burr’s prizewinning essay is available for download. He scrolls through it on his phone while Herc and Angelica cheerfully squabble.

The essay is about California water law. Alex’s heart might actually skip a beat, and God, he’s such a geek, isn’t he? He cut his teeth on this question, learned to read from newspaper Op-Eds about agricultural versus municipal versus corporate water rights. He reads the whole thing, finding himself humming in appreciation of particularly elegant turns of phrase, nodding to well-defended arguments. These are some good ideas. He might even call them obvious, individually—but he doesn’t think he’s ever seen them presented quite so cohesively in a group before. Intrigued, he Googles Burr.

“You’ve been quiet, Alex,” Angelica observes, what seems like a moment later.

“Hm?” Alex looks up. His plate is completely clean—he must have eaten it without noticing. Angelica’s food is likewise gone. Herc has left the table. In fact, the dining hall is mostly empty. A few cleaning ladies mop up spilled drinks, chatting to one another in Spanish about their plans for Thanksgiving break. “Have you just been sitting here watching me on my phone this whole time?”

“You’re really into this Aaron Burr guy, aren’t you?” Angelica says.

“He doesn’t have a Twitter.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“Or Instagram, or Snapchat, or—”

“Also not answers.”

“Angelica, he's not on _facebook_.”

“So?” Angelica raises an eyebrow. “I don’t have a facebook.”

“You don’t have a facebook because you’re too cool for facebook. Literally his only presence online is a profile on LinkedIn.”

“I have a LinkedIn,” she says, straightening her posture and folding together her hands in the posture of a Professional Woman. “Career Services gave me an ice cream sundae.”

Alex shakes his head in mock disgust. “How easily bought are the attentions of my dearest Angelica.”

She lets out a peal of laughter and slaps him on the arm, hard. He chuckles and resists the temptation to rub his burning skin. “Oh, so that’s how it is?” Her eyes flash with something that makes his stomach drop.

“So,” she says, leaning in closer. Oh, shit, is she gonna start things right here in the dining hall? What did he even eat for dinner—did it have onions, did it have garlic, how’s his breath—“since I’m your _dearest_ now”—she’s practically _purring_ , looming over him a little and holy _shit_ this is hot, and then she drops her voice to a whisper—“are you gonna tell me why the _fuck you’re stalking Aaron Burr?_ ”

Alex groans and sinks back in his chair, scrubbing his face with his hands. “I’m not stalking him.”

“Oh, I see. You just randomly became super interested in a guy you’ve never met, to the point where you asked me _and_ Herc to dig up dirt on him and spent literally half an hour so completely wrapped up in Googling him that you missed multiple statements addressed directly to you, but you’re not stalking him. Gotcha.”

Alex groans again. “Okay, when you put it like that… I admit, it sounds bad.” He sighs. For some reason it’s a lot harder to tell Angelica than it was to tell Herc. “Uh… Professor Cooper assigned him to be my writing tutor. I just—I need to know what I’m up against.”

Angelica’s brow furrows. She doesn’t immediately cry out at the injustice of his having been assigned a tutor, which stings. “What you’re… up against?” she repeats slowly, as though to be sure she understood.

“Yeah, I know, right!? It’s ridiculous.”

“Is it an ESL thing, with the writing? My roommate freshman year was from Korea and she could speak super well but the writing was—”

Alex stands up so quickly he almost knocks his chair over. “Wow, this conversation is over.” He grabs his plate and glass and fumbles his fork, diving after it with a curse. It gives Angelica time to get between him and the door.

“Alex, what are you doing? Slow down. Having to go to the writing center is nothing to be ashamed of—”

“I’ve been writing in English since I was a fucking toddler—I’ve been retweeted by Ezra fucking Klein—”

“I _never_ —oh, Alex, no, all I’m saying is that it never hurts to get some help, especially if you’re not from—”

He’s not gonna yell he won’t yell he _will not yell_ —

“I’m from California, Ange.” He never understood the use of the word “snapped” to describe speech until just now. His voice doesn’t sound like his own, every word pinched off with fury, and it brings Angelica up short. “Yes, I have a bit of an accent. I am bi-fucking-lingual and no, I am not fucking illiterate, and I do not need a fucking tutor.” The cleaning ladies are all looking at him. He’s almost shaking with the effort it takes to restrain himself, his heart like a fist punching the inside of his ribcage. He walks out the door as fast as he can, and when he gets outside he walks straight to the other end of campus in the cutting fall wind before doubling back to his dorm.

***

Alex lowers his hood cautiously, taking in the writing center with one hand still on the doorknob. It looks pretty much like an ordinary small classroom. Tables, chairs.  

“Hello, Alexander,” says the only other person in the room, standing up and holding out his hand. He has dark eyes, dark skin, and a very smooth voice. Maybe Alex has been listening to Herc babble about fashion too much, but he’s a little thrown by how put-together the guy’s outfit is. He’s wearing a ash-gray suit jacket over a charcoal button-down, and something about the texture of the jacket is really… interesting? Probably expensive. A wave of self-consciousness about his own clothes—clean, but that’s about the only thing they’ve got going for them—washes over him.

Alex shakes the guy’s hand, hoping he wasn’t just giving him the hairy eyeball. “Mister Burr!” he says, and then flinches, and then disguises his flinch with a cough. Watch, the guy’s going to say _call me Aaron, Mister Burr is my father_ —except he doesn’t have a father, does he? Will that make things more or less comfortable? Should Alex apologize or will that only draw attention to his fuck-up?

Burr lets it pass without comment. He gestures towards a chair, and Alexander flops down with as much ease as he can muster.

“Let’s get started, shall we?”

“Cool. Here’s my essay,” Alex says, tossing it onto the table.

“I’ve already read it.” Burr’s face gives nothing away. “Millie forwarded it to me.”

Alex stares into Burr’s careful blankness for ten whole seconds before he can’t stand it anymore. “Well, what did you think?”

Burr tilts his head minutely to one side, pondering the question. “I think your mind works very fast, and that you would benefit from diplomacy and focus.”

“I don’t do diplomacy.”

“It’s part of what you’re here to learn.”

“It’s not my style.”

Burr takes an audible breath and holds it for several seconds before letting it out. “Part of writing well is adjusting your style to suit your audience. There are conventions, Alexander.”

Conventions, right. Conventions he never learned in high school, apparently. Conventions that Professor Cooper’s going to be looking for on the regrade that’s going to make or break him. “Okay. Okay, how do I do that?”

Burr nods and takes the essay in his hands. “I have two main points. First, your audience will react more positively to your writing if your voice is more positive. Second, if you go on the attack less, and spend less time pre-empting possible attacks, you’ll be able to cut material. Millie told me that was a goal of yours.”

“It’s a goal of hers, sure. But I’m not here to be positive; I’m here to be right.” Alex can feel the blood rushing to his face. His writing is a direct expression of who he is and what he believes, and he’s not going to let Aaron Burr or Millie or college take that away from him.

“If you’re right and you can’t convince anybody you’re right, you’ll be stuck,” Burr says, in a tone of eminent reasonableness, his posture and his hands open. “I’m not here to change the essence of your arguments. I’m just here to help you get them in their best shape. Teach you how to play the game.”

 _Game-playing_ has never struck Alex as a particularly admirable skill, but at least Burr is acknowledging that what he’s doing isn’t actually making Alex’s writing _better_. It’s just helping him figure out whatever semi-arbitrary pattern that Professor C—that Millie will be happy with. And in the end, as long as the arguments are his own… maybe he can stand to dress them up a little differently.

Well, he’d better be able to stand it, if he’s going to survive four years here. Alex takes a deep breath. He can do this. He _has to_ do this.

And hell, Burr won the Henry Prize. His sentences are like clear water. He’s demonstrably a good writer; Alex shouldn’t act like this is going to be torture. “All right.”

“Good,” Burr says. It’s the most neutral-sounding “good” Alex has ever heard. Burr talks like he’s narrating an audio guide for a safety pin museum. “Let’s start with your methods. How did you go about writing this paper?”

“In one sitting,” Alex says proudly.

Burr reacts to that: his eyes bug out of his head slightly. His surprise doesn’t make him miss the conversational beat, though, and he replies, “From an outline?”

“I never outline,” Alex says. “The words just come.”

Alex watches carefully, but this time not a flicker of surprise reveals itself on Burr’s face. “That explains the structure,” he says.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“That it might be possible to present your points in a stronger order,” Burr says, still mirror-lake calm. Alex wants to disturb that calm, put Burr as off-balance as he feels, but he knows he can’t. He needs news of his cooperation to get back to Professor Cooper.

So when Burr asks, “Do you think you could outline what we have here, right now?” Alex swallows his objections that it’s a pointless exercise and gets to work.

It takes the rest of their hour-long appointment, but they outline Alex’s paper. In retrospect, Alex has to admit, he’s not entirely sure why he put the digression on Foucault smack dab between two sections discussing Locke.

“Right,” Burr says, when they’re done. “Now, looking at this, is there anything you would change?”

“Foucault’s gotta move,” Alex says ruefully.

“I was actually going to suggest you cut it entirely.”

The idea of cutting a whole section horrifies Alex. He’d thought they’d be compressing and rearranging, not… _amputating_.

Burr sees his distress. “You don’t have to include every good idea you have on the subject to write a good essay, Alexander. In fact, if you do that I almost guarantee you’ll write a bad essay. Focus is critical.”

“But I have to show that I—that I—” Alex stammers. He’s not sure what the end of that sentence is. That he has a shit-ton of ideas? He’s so used to having to bring every single thing he’s got to get what he wants. The idea of leaving something in reserve is terrifying.

Then he realizes that Burr called his ideas good, and gets even more tongue-tied. He shuts his mouth, glances back down at the page for a conversational escape, and finds one.

“But wouldn’t someone, seeing what I wrote here, decide to challenge this idea, and wouldn’t the concept of the panopticon be the perfect—”

“I have to admit, I’m not following you there,” Burr interrupts. “You clearly have the kind of mind that makes connections between things that are not—to the rest of us—obviously related. While the reasoning for this leap may be readily apparent to you, this kind of pre-emptive counter-counter argument is confusing to the reader when presented without context.”

Alex wilts. Someone calling him smart has never made him feel this dumb before. “But—but if I’ve left open an obvious avenue of attack, shouldn’t I defend—”

“ _Obvious_ is a relative term,” Burr says. “In general, for an essay of this length, I would probably raise a single possible counter-argument against one of my main points and present it in detail. You want to pick something that you judge your readers will be concerned about and give it a full and fair hearing—which will take a good amount of space. Then you counter that counter-argument. Perhaps it’s based on a fundamental misconception of the problem. Or perhaps despite the initial appeal the logic doesn’t hold together. Or perhaps it rests on a non-obvious mischaracterization or over-generalization of your initial point.”

“I know how to hit back,” Alex says, through gritted teeth.

A very faint quirk of Burr’s mouth, and his eyes dart down before returning to the essay between them. “Yes, you’ve demonstrated that,” he says quietly, and somehow it doesn’t feel like a burn this time— feels affectionate, even, a recognition or a tribute. Alex finds himself smirking, and their eyes meet, and in their mutual surprise that they’ve come to an agreement Alex feels something with more potential, something heady and exciting.

His phone alarm goes off. “Shit,” he says. 1:55— he can make it if he runs. He shoves his paper into his backpack and slings it on, wincing as he hits himself in the back at an angle, right where the pain is still fading.

“Are you—” Burr begins.

“Fine,” he says, “just— _chemistry_ , wow, shit—”

Burr looks confused.

“See you Thursday!” Alex dashes out the door, and it’s only as he’s sneaking in the back of the lecture hall afterwards that he realizes what Burr must have thought he meant. He tries to chuckle about it, but the laugh dies in the uneasy turn of his stomach.

***

Chemistry lecture is never a special treat, but today it’s especially annoying because his brain is still firmly fixed on Burr, and Lewis acids and bases are trickier than they look and he really should be focusing on his notes. He’s just about the only one without a laptop, but the secondhand ThinkPad that Mrs. Stevens gave him weighs like, fourteen pounds and has a fan that sounds like the space shuttle taking off. When someone asked why he uses a paper notebook he blathered something about mindfulness and intentionality and now they all think he’s an eccentric chemistry guru, which he’ll definitely take over dirt fucking poor.

Focus just isn’t coming, though; in between copying down slides he goes through his outline a couple times, trying to figure out what his favorite counter-counter argument is so he can expand that one and cut the rest. It’s hard. Maybe he’ll ask Angelica what she thinks, if she’s speaking to him after yesterday at the dining hall.

For that matter, is _he_ still speaking to _her_? He thinks so. He’s kind of embarrassed at how he acted. Most people aren’t as sensitive to unintentional slights as he is, and he wonders if he’s always going to have this problem, if his tendency to counterattack is really a spontaneous exothermic reaction between his past and his future.

Burr… Burr has a fucking point, maybe.

Maybe he should apologize to Angelica, or try to joke it away, or something. Just get back her wit and her fire and her teeth biting his lower lip and her manicured fingernails digging in over his hipbones because she wants him angled just so...

The second he thinks it, his phone buzzes.

**_Alex, I’m really sorry I upset you yesterday. Can we talk?_ **

It’s strange— reading her apology makes him mad at her again. English! She really asked him if he was struggling with fucking _English_ ? Like he doesn’t speak it better than 99% of the mumbling monoglots he encounters! Like he hasn’t stopped dreaming in Spanish already, like he doesn’t find himself reaching for words when he’s on the phone with his brother. If he’s going to let English cannibalize Spanish’s place in his mind, at least Angelica and everyone else can respect that he’s _really fucking good at English_.

 **We can talk tonight** , he replies. Then, because he’s feeling spiteful, he adds, **and I’m not coming over to your room, either. You come to me.** Then his dick chimes in with an eggplant emoji, which his brain points out is maybe undermining his point here, but it’s too late; he’s already hit send.

“Now, by contrast, Brønsted-Lowry…”

Oh fuck, he was really spacing out there. Hurriedly he draws a table in his notebook for the ol’ compare-and-contrast game and scrambles to fill it in as the professor talks.

***

He’d kind of forgotten about Herc in the other half of the suite whenever he invited Angelica over, but thank God, Herc has RA rounds tonight. Alex doesn’t really want an audience for this conversation or what he’s mightily hoping comes after.

Especially since Angelica, always full of surprises, decides to put that part first.

It’s a little hard to be mad at her afterwards. They’re nestled together like open books on his extra-long twin bed, but even so her back’s almost pressed against the wall and his half-bent knees almost dangle over the edge. One of her arms rests in the crook of his side, and her fingernails scrape idle patterns on the soft inside of his forearm.

“You know,” she murmurs, “I _did_ still want to talk.”

Alex moans, but half-heartedly. His brain is marinating in its own endorphins and it’s hard to be too afraid of confrontation right now, especially since Angelica’s had nothing but praise for him tonight. He feels more secure with her arm over him than he has in days, as stupid as that sounds.

“I’ll start, since I’m the one insisting,” she says. “I’m sorry that I was so thoughtless at dinner yesterday.”

“Thanks,” Alex says, slightly stunned. She’s taking this really seriously, isn’t she? Obviously _he’d_ taken it really seriously but he’s at least half convinced that’s just him being too… everything.

“I mean it. People say stupid shit to me all the time and I promised myself that I wouldn’t do that to anybody. So I wanted to apologize that your feelings were hurt.”

“Oh...kay?”

“And I also wanted to say that I see what language someone is most comfortable in as a value-neutral thing, but I guess you’re coming from a place where maybe that’s not the case? So I didn’t realize that what I was saying might hurt your feelings, but I also realize that maybe this is sensitive for you and I respect that.”

She pauses to give Alex a space to reply, but Alex is still digesting what she’s said. She rushes on.

“... and I wonder if maybe you’d like to talk to somebody about it? And that doesn’t have to be me, because God knows I’m no good at this, but if—”

“Angelica, if you suggest I go to counseling, I fucking swear, I’ll—”

“What? No no no, I was going to suggest Herc!”

“Oh.” Alex’s sudden fury deflates. There he goes again, countering before there’s been any attack. “Sorry.”

“No, no, you’re fine. We’ve already established that this is a rough area.”

Alex sighs. _Rough area_ is certainly one way of describing it. His previous bliss contracts, curling up in his body until abruptly turning inside-out and spilling pure fucking melancholy everywhere. He sighs and presses his face into the bed and blurts, “Do you think I belong here?”

A tiny bobble of a pause before, “Alex, you deserve to be here.”

“I didn’t ask what I deserve,” Alex says. “I asked if I belonged here.”

What he expects is a probing question on what, exactly, the difference between those two things is supposed to be. Instead, Angelica hugs him closer. “You’re not the only one of us who’s wondered that, Alex.”

“Really?” Alex blurts. “You? But you’re… you’re so, so…”

“Yeah? Well, you’re _so_ , too.”

Alex laughs bitterly. “No, I’m not. I thought I was, but I’m not. I can’t even write an essay for a fucking freshman seminar without help—”

“Nobody gets through without help,” Angelica says fiercely. “You think I didn’t have help?”

“You didn’t have _tutoring_.”

“Well, no, but I did have AP English in high school, and a shit-ton of writing enrichment classes and clubs since when I was tiny. I’ve been getting feedback on my writing from people who went to schools just like this one literally since I could write. Not to mention I had my mom proofread every single essay I wrote freshman year.”

“You did?” Alex asks, incredulously. “I… I didn’t realize you still ask your parents for help on things.”

“Oh, yeah. Everybody does. I mean, most people don’t talk about it because it’s not good for the _imaaaaahge_ ”—she draws out the word absurdly—“but I ask my mom for help literally all the fucking time. Not with like, proofreading anymore. But if maybe there’s a boy whose feelings I care a lot about who I might have said something insensitive to and I want to make it right...”

Alex almost sits up in alarm, but Angelica’s laying on the sheet and his legs are entangled. “You told your _mom_ about us?” He should be mad about that, right? He's not sure why but he has a vague idea that some guys might get indignant about such things. Mama Schuyler knows who he is...but this feeling definitely isn't a bad one.

Hell, it might be hope.

“Only in vague terms,” Angelica says hurriedly. “I wasn’t like, _Alexander Hamilton of central California and I have recently embarked upon a sensual and intellectual co-exploration of the profoundest mysteries of se_ —EEE!”

She cuts off with a shriek as Alex, twisting wildly to free himself from the sheets, seizes the pillow out from under her head and whacks her with it.

After that, they return to more pleasant subjects.

***

“So,” Herc asks, “how'd the writing center go?”

Herc’s giving the blazer a final inspection, and Alex is trying not to breathe too hard as he squints and considers the alignment of the buttons.

“Uh… in retrospect, it was maybe not the worst thing I have ever experienced.” And whatever else, Alex had indeed trimmed his essay down to twelve pages, with many cuts and a few rearrangements and new transitions to make it flow, and a reworked conclusion to hammer his points home. As much as he hates to think it, he’s kind of likes the revised version. He still thinks the old one's better overall, but he’s proud that he was able to maintain the essential character of his ideas and through-line of his argument while meeting Professor Cooper’s arbitrary criteria.

Herc’s giving him a wry look, so Alex lets it turn into a joke.

“Like… kidney stones. Much better than kidney stones.”

“I should hope so. Speaking of kidney stones… have you been feeling better lately?”

Alex nods. “Trust me, I’m drinking approximately one Euphrates of water every day.” He’s absurdly pleased Herc thought to ask. Which, sure, Herc had driven him to and from the doctor’s office, which must have been a pain in the ass, so he has a vested interest in making sure Alex doesn't need to go again. But his interest feels much warmer than that.

“And how was Burr?”

Burr. Burr, Burr, Burr. True to his name, he’d snagged Alex’s thoughts. He’d found himself mulling his words— about playing the game, about conventions. Rereading his prizewinning essay and admiring afresh the economy of Burr’s arguments, the way he carefully glossed over those areas where there would be no pleasing anyone.

But every time he’d looked it over he’d liked it less. He’s not quite sure, anymore, that Burr’s claiming as much as Alex thought he was. His brain had filled in some things Burr had understated and underspecified— the letter of the argument is less substantive than Alex’s memory of it. He’d say that it’s lazy, but sanding some of the sharpest edges off his own essay has shown him how hard it is to be this un-provocative. It’s a work of genius, in a way.

Chickenshit, but genius. “I think he’s hiding something,” he announces. “He’s the type to see more than be seen, if you know what I mean.”

“Consider me interested,” Herc says, and of _course_ he is, with a statement like that. “Why?”

“I don’t know,” Alex says. “I just… do you ever just _know_ there’s something more to someone?”

“Yes, but typically I know what that _more_ is,” Herc counters.   

Alex is cut off from the reply he was about to give by Herc's phone ringing. Herc sighs, sets down his pins, and answers.

There's about a minute of uninterrupted talk before Herc says, "Okay, let me get this straight: you're cancelling the order?"

A short, flat reply.

Alex makes an alarmed face. Herc waves him off.

"Yes, of course, I understand. I hope you'll keep me in mind for any future projects," he says smoothly. "Oh, of course. You too. Have a good night."

"Was that the girl who..." Alex begins, indicating the green blazer he’s wearing.

"Yup."

"She fucking cancelled on you? Does she know how much time you spent—"

"I have people pay 50% of my labor costs up front, plus materials." Herc says. "So it's not as big a loss as you might think.”

“But— but how could she just— just _cancel_ something she commissioned?!”

Herc shrugs. “Said she’d gotten a job offer as a news anchor. Realized too late that green screen is a thing that exists. Seemed really sad; apparently it’s her color.”

Alex snorts, and Herc brightens. “Hey, do you want it? It’s your color, too."

Alex is so flabbergasted at the offer, he immediately refuses. "Do I... no, no, you worked hard on this, you need to resell it to somebody so you can get fucking paid—"

"Yeah, but I haven't paid you. 'sbeen kinda weighing on me, actually."

"What would you pay me for?" Alex asks, nonplussed. “I thought I was paying you back for the doctor’s office?”

“What? No, that was me being your RA. The school already paid me for that.”

“Okay, but that doesn’t explain how you suddenly owe _me_ anyth—”

“For being my new Thimbelina, of course.”

Oh. Alex hadn’t thought of that as work, but come to think of it, it had taken up quite a bit of his time.

He steps over to the mirror, considering the idea.

"Do you think it fits me?" he asks, tugging nervously at the lapels.

Herc reaches over his shoulder and straightens them back out again. "I mean, you got to model because you have almost exactly the same measurements as that skinny white girl, so for the sake of my future career I sure do fucking hope it fits."

"Sorry," Alex says. He can't seem to take his eyes off his reflection. It's not like he's never worn green before. Or even this particular blazer. But it’s never had the potential to be _his_ before.

"I can switch the buttons to the other side, if it bothers you," Herc says.

"What?"

"The buttons. In menswear they're traditionally on the right, in womenswear on the left. These are on the left, but if you'd like me to—"

Alex is flattered that Herc would be willing to labor over buttons that long for him, but— "no, that's not it. It's just..."

The mirror tugs him back in.

"You're not sure it's _you_?" Herc asks, his tone half-serious.

And that, Alex thinks, is another bizarre turn of phrase. Why did people say _that shirt is so you_ , or _these shoes are so me_ , as though clothes could somehow have personalities, as though the packaging said anything about the contents?

He thinks again of the mystery of Burr, cloaked in black and gray, classically generic. Someone who didn’t want to give too much away. Someone who provoked intrigue, the desire to know— or who could fade into the background at will.

There will be no fading into the background with this. It’s very, very distinctive—but Alex wants to be recognized. The green is rich, but not that red-purple old money rich; it’s rich like something that grew out of the earth, something flourishing and new. Garden-green. He squints in the mirror, trying to measure the gap between who he sees and who he is, and says, "I think it could be, someday. Soon."

"Well, then" Herc smiles, clapping him on the shoulder, "I guess you'll grow into it."

***

Partially because he wants to be dramatic, and partially to put Burr off his guard and maybe see another face from him, Alex doesn’t email him the revised essay before their second session. Instead, he prints it out and drops it in front of Burr as soon as he walks in. The green blazer swishes a little as he takes his seat, but at least now he’s as fancy as Burr. That’s one disadvantage leveled, at least.

Burr gives him an indecipherable look, picks the essay up, and starts to read.

Alex fidgets as he watches Burr read. This was a tactical error. Burr is more patient than he is, and he has something to do with himself, his eyes deliberately scanning through, his tongue occasionally licking a finger before he turns a page. Alex, by contrast, has nothing to do but watch Burr and suddenly pray that there are no typos that might bring him eternal shame. Not that he particularly cares what Burr thinks. He’s proud of this essay and this is what he’s going to turn in, no matter what Burr says. This meeting is just a formality so Professor Cooper knows Alex is jumping through all her stupid hoops.

When Burr’s done, he looks up with something almost like… an expression.

“Well?” Alex asks, slightly discomfited, “What do you think?”

"It's very _you_ ," Burr says. The expression, Alex decides, is another smirk, which doesn't count. He's already seen a smirk. "But it's also very good. You should submit this for the Henry Prize."

Warmth rushes into Alex’s chest, even though he’d been so determined not to let Burr’s opinion of him matter. “I… it's juniors and seniors only, I thought.”

“You’ll need a professor to nominate you. Millie will do it.”

Alex grimaces. “I don’t know if she—”

“Millie will do it.” Nothing changes about Burr’s voice or face that Alex can see, but suddenly he knows exactly how it’ll go. At the end of their weekly meeting Burr will ask her, smoothly framing the request in such a way that she’ll say yes without even thinking about it. As in his writing, so in his life: Burr’s so blandly innocuous, so obviously correct, you find your mind flowing down the path of least resistance with him, and only realize later, if at all, that he’d staked out that path so subtly you’d never even considered another. Alex’s instinct is to beat other arguments into submission. Burr just… makes it easier to think his way.

“Why are you doing this?” Alex asks.

“Because you write well,” Burr says. “You’re going places.”

Alex turns Burr’s words over, wondering at the meaning behind the meaning. Why is he complimenting Alex now? Maybe there’s a little shred of too-much honesty in there. He remembers Burr’s words on the day they met: _you’ve got to play the game_. This must be Burr playing the game. Because Alex agrees that he’s going places. Maybe with this essay Burr’s finally figured that out. Maybe he’s calculated that he’ll be happy one day when Alex owes him a favor.

That’s probably it.

“Thanks,” Alex says, forcing a smile, because hey, it’s nice (and kind of a relief) that his abilities are _finally_ being acknowledged here. “Well, time for me to get to lecture.” There’s still twenty minutes to go before it starts, but it feels like Burr’s expecting him to stay and Alex isn’t sure what the point would be. He shoulders his backpack.

Something is different about Burr’s face. Shit, does he want Alex to be more grateful? “It really means a lot to me that you think I’m worthy of this opportunity,” he rattles off, the words he's said so often his tongue knows them by rote. But then it keeps tripping along, loosened, perhaps, by his knowledge of what else he and Burr have in common. "I—with the money. My parents aren't around anymore to... chip in. I... without the resources, I just... every little bit helps, you know?"

Whatever Burr’s face was doing, it starts doing it more.

Alex clears his throat. "I heard that you also—I mean, Angelica told me. That your parents were also... um."

"My parents left me a substantial trust," Burr says. His voice isn't cold, exactly, just... distant. Like he's reading about a character in a book instead of telling Alex something about his life. "You'd better get to your lecture, I guess."

Alex pulls back, whatever tenuous connection he felt snapped like a broken thread, and Burr seems to realize himself, his face smoothing back to its usual bland placidity. It’s only once the previous expression is gone that Alex is able to identify what was different: little lines of discomfort and unhappiness around his mouth.

“Have a nice day, Alexander,” Burr says, and Alex leaves thinking  _I'm a_ _fucking idiot_ and  _Jesus, what's wrong with him_ and _well, so much for the Henry Prize_. He doesn’t even ask Professor Cooper for her nomination. Without Burr's support, she'd never even consider him for it.

Two months later, he gets an email saying he’s won.

 


End file.
